bad metro COPSto be suspended

Four Johannesburg Metro policemen will this morning be served with suspension letters after a Sowetan exposé on Friday showed them allegedly taking bribes.

Metro police spokesman Superintendent Wayne Minnaar said disciplinary procedures against two male and two female officers was already in progress.

The four were filmed allegedly taking money from hawkers who set a trap to expose the corruption.

In the film the supervisor of the Metro storage facility in Dube, Soweto, where the impounded goods of illegal hawkers are kept, is seen taking money from traders to release their stock.

The hawkers' goods are then returned to them via the back door of the building. Phone conversations between the traders and officers were also recorded.

Minnaar said the internal hearings would start soon.

"Suspension letters are being served today," Minnaar said. "Soon after we received the video and watched the footage we called the officers in and transferred them from Dube to Johannesburg so that they had no contact with Dube.

"If they are found guilty they will be fired. Metro police are there to serve the community, not to take from them."

Friday's Sowetandetailed how certain Metro cops took bribes from hawkers who had infringed on municipal by-laws by trading in restricted areas.

Three Soweto hawkers, enraged by the goings-on, decided to record them and handed the film over to the Metro police anti-corruption unit.

Minnaar said anyone who witnesses Metro police corruption should call the anti-corruption hotline number 0800-203-712.